He snorted and began walking to her car. “Lady, that can of pepper spray is about as effective against me as it would be against a grizzly bear. Believe me, I'm here to help – not hurt. And if that means leaving you here alone while I save the dog, so be it. Either way, me and him are leaving.Now."
He shifted Trigger to his left arm, grabbed her back door and yanked it open. Then he eased the dog into her back seat and stood back, his arm propped on the open door. “You coming ornot?”
Audra clutched her pepper spray and stared at his chest, trying to catch another glimpse of his dog tags, but all she saw was bare skin and cut muscles. “Fine. But if you try anything, I’ll make you regretit.”
Audra slid into the back seat and took Trigger’s head onto her lap, fighting the flinch when Diggs slammed the door shut. Then she remembered the bat. Jeremy’s team had surprised him with it at graduation. She couldn’t leave it here, forgotten and rotting in the dirt. “Wait! I need thebat!”
Diggs paused half-way into the front seat, his jaw ticking. “Why?”
She thought frantically for an answer that wouldn’t invite more questions. “Evidence.”
He let out a muttered curse, then slid out of the car, returning seconds later to open the back seat and toss the pieces of the bat onto the floor board at herfeet.
She touched the broken pieces with trembling hands. She’d clean it and glue it back together. And when this was all over, she’d make her fatherpay.
Trigger whimpered and she felt like she’d been stabbed.Don’t worry, boy, I’ll take care ofyou.
Trigger was going home with her. That’s what Jeremy would have wanted, and she’d make sure he lived out the rest of his life surrounded by every luxury a dog could have. That’s the life he should’ve had in the first place before the military sucked him into their dark vacuum of violence and forced him to become a bomb-sniffing dog. It was the military’s fault Trigger no longer had his frontleg.
And it was their fault her brother wasdead.
It was all just too much, too soon. Losing her brother. And now, close to losingTrigger.
She’d completely failed to protect those sheloved.
Not again. If it took her the rest of her life, she’d find out the truth behind her brother’s death and persecute thoseresponsible.
Diggs cleared his throat. “We good togo?”
Audra caressed Trigger with one hand, and with her pepper spray in the other hand, she took a deep breath and said, “Yeah, let’sgo.”
Diggs closed the back door, went around to his side and wedged his massive frame into the front seat of her tiny smart car. He had to work at it too, shifting his shoulders over inch by inch so he could shut the door. His knees were jammed up against the steering column and he had to work at getting around his legs to push the start button. The image was so silly that it managed to pull her out of her dark shell the tiniest little bit. “I don’t think my car was made for people yoursize.”
Diggs glanced over his shoulder, some of his expression tempered by annoyance. “Are you calling mefat?”
Audra slapped a hand over her mouth and leaned back in the seat, only able to capture back part of the giggle that escaped her lips. Fat? The man was a walking talking god. She’d bet if she lifted up the edge of his shirt, she’d see a six-pack chiseled from concrete. Big, yes. Gorgeous, most definitely. Fat? Not in a million years. “I was thinking more along the lines of … tall.” She’d just met the man. She had no intention of telling him she thought he washot.
He grumbled but turned back to the steering wheel. “Whoever makes cars like this should beshot.”
Audra gently stroked Trigger’s sweaty hair, trying to give him some measure of comfort. His eyes were closed and his tongue hung out as he panted in short rapid bursts. He didn’t need to whimper for her to know he was in acute pain. If she kept thinking about how close she’d come to losing him, she’d go insane. So, she grasped on to the thin straw of distraction that Diggs offered with his mindless conversation. “This car gets fifty-eight miles to the gallon, and doesn’t pollute theenvironment.”
Cramped or not, the ozone thanked her every time she hit start on hercar.
Not the empty water bottles covering her floor—well, no one wasperfect.
Diggs took off, swinging her smart car in a wide arc to the left, making a U-turn in the road. He kept shifting trying to get comfortable but it was like a Bengal tiger trying to get comfortable in a Chihuahua’scage.
He grumbled again. “I feel like I’m driving a toycar.”
This time she did smile. “But you’re saving theenvironment.”
The glare he cast her in the rear view mirror was enough to melt ice. “If you sayso.”
The car slowed and he turned in between a minuscule break in the trees down what appeared to be an overgrown paved road, just wide enough for a car to squeeze through. Limbs scraped across her windows and doors and shecringed.
“Sorry, we lost our lawn maintenance man. I need to get up here and trim these bushes backsome.”
“It’s okay, I don’t care as long as you can help Trigger,” she said. He could scrape all the paint off her car if it meant saving her brother’sdog.
